The acceptance of the Christian faith can be achieved only by an exercise of free willRead more at location 276
“no one, certainly, is obliged to assist others out of what is required for his own necessary use” (#36),Read more at location 280
“These are duties not of justice, except in cases of extreme need, but of Christian charity, which obviously cannot be enforced by legal action” (#36).Read more at location 281
He then concludes that “in all these cases, the power and authority of the law, but of course within certain limits, manifestly ought to be employed” (#53).Read more at location 295
even when permitting governmental intervention, Leo is quick to establish a limitation set by reason and subsidiarity—thatRead more at location 298
“To preserve one’s life,” he maintains, “is a duty common to all individuals, and to neglect this duty is a crime” (#62).Read more at location 303
Leo would have benefited from a broader view of the way in which wage rates affect the whole of the economy. If the rate of wages is artificially high, the cost of the goods produced by labor will increase throughout the whole economy, placing many of those goods outside the reach of the workers, who are also consumers.Read more at location 305
His interest in ensuring that workers obtained the highest possible wage was that he wanted them to become mini-capitalists,Read more at location 311
If a worker receives a wage sufficiently large to enable him to provide comfortably for himself [and his family, he will eventually be able to] come into the possession of a little wealth. We have seen, in fact, that the whole question under consideration cannot be settled effectually unless it is assumed and established as a principle, that the right of private property must be regarded as sacred (#65, emphasis added).Read more at location 313
Differences of opinion in the application of principles can sometimes arise even among sincere Catholics. When this happens, they should be careful not to lose their respect and esteem for each other. Instead, they should strive to find points of agreement for effective and suitable action, and not wear themselves out in interminable arguments, and, under pretext of the better or the best, omit to do the good that is possible and therefore obligatory (Mater et Magistra #238).Read more at location 320
he could not offer exact public policy prescriptions. Rather, his intention was to propose some guiding moral principlesRead more at location 325
human dignity, charity, love of the poor, the bonds of the human family, and subsidiarity.Read more at location 327
such a reading of Rerum Novarum demonstrates the integrity of Centesimus Annus as a consistent developmentRead more at location 335
The usual response from better Catholic social thinkers is to recognize the condemnation of socialism but also to reject liberalismRead more at location 344
Pope John Paul II makes this clear in Sollicitudo Rei Socialis: The Church’s social doctrine is not a “third way” between liberal capitalism and Marxist collectivism, nor even a possible alternative to other solutions less radically opposed to one another: Rather, it constitutes a category of its own. Nor is it an ideology, but rather the accurate formulation of the results of a careful reflection on the complex realities of human existence, in society and in the international order, in the light of faith and of the Church’s tradition. Its main aim is to interpret these realities, determining their conformity with or divergence from the lines of the Gospel teaching on man and his vocation, a vocation that is at once earthly and transcendent; its aim is thus to guide Christian behavior. It therefore belongs to the field, not of ideology, but of theology and particularly of moral theology (#41).Read more at location 349
reduce Catholic social teaching to merely one sociopolitical ideology among many.Read more at location 359
My contention is that Pope Leo chose a slow and steady course of dialogue with liberalism—aRead more at location 362
several of them, including the Geneva Alliance and the Fribourg Union, influenced Leo’s thought.Read more at location 374
He rejected what he perceived to be the materialism of the new economic order, but he was not averse to technological progress.Read more at location 376
According to Franz H. Mueller, “Ketteler … had become more and more convinced of the need of government intervention in social and economic matters, and particularly for protective labor legislation. Brentano … had insisted that only through unionization could the labor market become truly competitive.”Read more at location 378
Rerum Novarum lent its support to various worker associations or labor unions.Read more at location 382
American effort to secure the Vatican’s recognition of the Knights of Labor impressed Leo deeply.Read more at location 383
he paid close attention to the pro-labor activities of cardinals such as Gibbons and Henry Edward Manning of England.Read more at location 387
American Developments of Social ThoughtRead more at location 390
Note: La sinistra interpreta la Rerum rivendicando un ruolo + ampio per lo stato. Per i movimenti progressisti migliorare la condizione dei lavoratori implica un intervento statale. Non ci sono alternative... La funzione sociale della proprietà privata: la p.p. è un diritto naturale che lo stato deve regolare. Il ruolo sociale della p.p. prevale (contrariamente al dettato della Rerum che radicava la p.p. nell'individuo). Ecco il concetto chiave con cui il socialismo cacciato dalla porta rientrava dalla finestra. Ecco spiegato anche lo stretto legame tra Chiesa e Sindacati... La Chiesa si interessa solo dei lavoratori nn alza mai lo sguardo s 365 gradi, l'avidità capitalista è equiparata al socialismo ... L'attrazione verso il socialismo era irresistibile. Leo lo aveva condannato perchè materialista ma la sua posizione era percepita come "esagerata"... Nella Centesimus la musica cambia. Si celebra anche la creatività dell'imprenditore e le virtù dell'uomo produttivo: diligenza, prudenza, affidabilità, autocontrollo. Si legittima il profitto personale sia moralmente che praticamente. Si accusa lo stato assistenziale di deresponsabilizzare l'individuo, s'invoca il principio di sussidiarietà. Ma soprattutto si fa esplicita una scelta di campo liberale invocando un capitalismo che metta al centro l'uomo (par. 42). La parificazione etica tra socialismo e capitalismo - che alcuni individuavano nella Sollecitudo - viene fugata. Bisogna risalire ai tardo-scolastici per incontrare un atteggiamento tanto aperto al mercato. La scuola austriaca e quella virginiana sembrano tra le fonti ispiratrici e ad ammetterlo sono i fautori marxisti della teologia della liberazione... Dove la Centesimus ammette l'intervento statale? Salari, previdenza sociale, sussidi di disoccupazione... La Centesimus distingue tra aspetto etico e aspetto economico: si critica il consumismo pur nell'opzione per l'economia libera. Edit
Pope Leo understood laissez faire as the philosophy of the business and political establishment.Read more at location 400
the key to Leo’s thinking was that such groups would work in what is now referred to as “civil society,” thus lessening the need for governmental action.Read more at location 408
The progressive Left swiftly took up the task of giving Rerum Novarum its own social interpretation.Read more at location 409
securing a “living wage,” eliminating Sunday labor, shortening the work day, and prohibiting or regulating the labor of children and women in the factories,Read more at location 411
Ironically, several governmental expansions were justified, in part, by citing Rerum Novarum.Read more at location 414
“use the taxing power to favor the multiplication of property owners,” despite the fact that this was expressly warned against in Rerum Novarum (#47).Read more at location 418
In the minds of such activists, public response was often equated with an increase in the role of the State.Read more at location 421
many reformers saw the role of government as being chiefly concerned with promoting human welfare.Read more at location 424
According to Abell, “A social view of property … served as the entering wedge for much contemporary and future American Catholic participation in social reform.”Read more at location 428
contrary to that expressed by Leo, who articulated a view of property rooted in the individual but also having social dimensions.Read more at location 429
The Successors of Leo XIII have repeated this twofold affirmation: the necessity and therefore the legitimacy of private ownership, as well as the limits which are imposed on it. The Second Vatican Council likewise clearly restated the traditional doctrine in words that bear repeating: “In making use of the exterior things we lawfully possess, we ought to regard them not just as our own but also as common, in the sense that they can profit not only the owners but others too” (GS #69); and a little later we read: “Private property or some ownership of external goods affords each person the scope needed for personal and family autonomy, and should be regarded as an extension of human freedom.… Of its nature, private property also has a social function that is based on the law of the common purpose of goods” (GS #71) (Centesimus Annus #30).Read more at location 433
The burden for relieving the poor, in this view, must fall directly on the State. According to Abell, “These early State interventionists upheld the right of workers to organize and to engage their employers on the battle field of industry; they doubted labor’s power, without the aid of the State, to wring justice from entrenched capital.”Read more at location 442
were coming to the conclusion “that we must, more than we have hitherto done, make over to the State a closer oversight of the relations between classes.”Read more at location 446
during the 1880s, sympathy for the labor movement was born in the hearts of nearly all socially concerned CatholicsRead more at location 448
Two Catholic congresses were also instrumental in fixing this pro-labor sentiment in people’s minds.Read more at location 452
aimed at mobilizing clerical and lay persons for “progressive social action.”Read more at location 455
The congresses were well-attended and equated capitalist greed with socialism and communism,Read more at location 456
Protestant advocates who were friendly to the growing notion of the Social Gospel reacted enthusiastically.Read more at location 460
Church should now lead the people to emancipation from “social and economic slavery”Read more at location 474
according to Abell, the social movement never really gained momentum during the decade-and-a-half following the promulgation of the encyclical. Abell attributes this to racial dissention among American Catholics, a reference to the waves of immigration that swept the country in the last half of the nineteenth and early part of the twentieth century.Read more at location 476
The new arrivals, predominantly from central and eastern Europe after 1900, were often accused of being involved in Socialist causes.Read more at location 480
The period between 1912 and the beginning of World War I was the time of its greatest appeal.Read more at location 482
many Catholic priests and laity became involved in the increasingly active Socialist movement.Read more at location 484
The American hierarchy repeatedly censured socialism as being materialistic,Read more at location 485
Social activists, in turn, argued that these condemnations by the hierarchy were exaggerated,Read more at location 487
These new reformers argued that socialism contained in itself seeds of Catholic truthRead more at location 498
indirect methods of augmenting the workers’ income through legislative action, [including] the eight-hour day; restriction on the labor of women and children; legalization of picketing, persuasion and boycotting; conciliation and arbitration by State and national boards with compulsory powers; and relief of unemployment by State employment bureaus, labor colonies, and social insurance. Likewise, provisions should be made against accidents, illness, and old age. Finally, the State should launch a housing program, not only condemning and preventing unsanitary housing and congestion, but erecting decent habitations for the poorer classes, to be rented or sold—preferably sold—on easy conditions.Read more at location 503
Ryan also advocated public ownership of natural monopolies, progressive income and inheritance taxation, taxation on future increases in land values, and prohibition of speculation on the exchanges.Read more at location 509
Ryan contended that economic socialism was not only in the best tradition of papal teaching but that its promotion was good strategy.Read more at location 516
After 1908, a widespread Catholic movement for social reform developed, with Ryan as its leader.Read more at location 520
It set up summer schools for social study in 1912 at Spring Bank, Wisconsin, and at Fordham University, and lobbied for a Catholic School of Social Science to be established.Read more at location 525
According to Ryan, those who reject the principle of a living wage must also reject the inherent worth of the person and the reality of all moral rights.Read more at location 534
living wage must not be determined solely by the work done; it is derived from man’s dignity.Read more at location 546
he “deprives himself of one of the most effective means of developing the finer side of his character.… Only in the family is it possible for the majority of men to develop those social feelings that are essential to the welfare of a democratic society.”Read more at location 556
Leo XIII, like all subsequent popes, admits that worker productivity is an essential elementRead more at location 562
minimum-wage laws were too sweeping to account for differences across regions and across industries,Read more at location 572
Ryan seemed unaware of the unintended consequences of mandated wage rates, including increased unemployment and the rising cost of living.Read more at location 585
American Federation of Labor, the National Civic Federation, and the American Association for Labor Legislation.Read more at location 591
He believed that Protestants were putting Catholics to shame by their energetic support of labor,Read more at location 596
American Federation of Catholic Societies formed a Social Service Commission to promote labor’s cause.Read more at location 601
establishment of schools, as well as for inclusion of social science study into the curriculum.Read more at location 603
The hierarchy formed the National Catholic War Council in 1917 to deal with post-war social reconstruction.Read more at location 610
[S]ocial insurance against unemployment, sickness, invalidity, and old age; a federal child-labor law; legal enforcement of labor’s right to organize; public housing for the working classes; progressive taxation of inheritances, incomes, and excess profits; stringent regulation of public utilities rates; government competition with monopolies; … worker participation in management; and co-operative productive societies and co-partnership arrangements in order to enable the majority of wage earners to “become owners … of the instruments of production.”33Read more at location 613
The Catholic social movement has continued from that time until the present to argue essentially the same pointsRead more at location 622
Social changes during the period after World War II were naturally reflected in Catholic social movements. Specialization and organization became more and more characteristic of Catholic as well as other efforts. As the role of organized labor in American society was stabilized … the labor movement was less prominent than formerly as a battleground for social justice.35Read more at location 626
More than labor, today’s liberationist and environmentalist movements are the means by which the Christian Left wages its battles for “social justice.”Read more at location 629
Pope John XXIII wrote two social encyclicals—Mater et Magistra (1961) and Pacem in Terris (1963).Read more at location 638
More than any other Church document, this latest encyclical celebrates the creativity of entrepreneurs and the virtues required for productivity. John Paul lists these virtues: “diligence, industriousness, prudence in taking reasonable risks, reliability and fidelity in interpersonal relationships, as well as courage in carrying out decisions that are difficult and painful but necessary, both for the overall working of a business and in meeting possible setbacks”(#32). The pope affirms both the practical and moral legitimacy of profit, entrepreneurship, appropriate self-interest, productivity, and a stable currency.Read more at location 647
Returning now to the initial question: Can it perhaps be said that, after the failure of Communism, capitalism is the victorious social system, and that capitalism should be the goal of the countries now making efforts to rebuild their economy and society? Is this the model that ought to be proposed to the countries of the Third World that are searching for the path to true economic and civil progress? The answer is obviously complex. If, by “capitalism,” is meant an economic system that recognizes the fundamental and positive role of business, the market, private property, as well as free human creativity in the economic sector, then the answer is certainly in the affirmative, even though it would perhaps be more appropriate to speak of a business economy, market economy, or simply, free economy. But, if, by “capitalism” is meant a system in which freedom in the economic sector is not circumscribed within a strong juridical framework that places it at the service of human freedom in its totality and sees it as a particular aspect of that freedom, the core of which is ethical and religious, then the reply is certainly negative.Read more at location 654
The Church has sided with a humane form of liberalism, at least in its economic aspects.Read more at location 663
the pope expresses deep reservations throughout the document about various forms of State economic intervention.Read more at location 669
a considerably different tone from that of the United States bishops in their 1986 statement on the economy, “Economic Justice for All.”Read more at location 670
having seen the deleterious impact of governmental encroachments in Eastern EuropeanRead more at location 673
questions the legitimacy of extensive intervention by the welfare State, or what he calls the social assistance State.Read more at location 674
His criticism of the welfare State applies equally to all statist and collectivist agendas.Read more at location 677
What appeared to some commentators on his first social encyclical, Laborem Exercens, as a turn to dialogue with Marxists,Read more at location 680
the warmest embrace of the free economy by an important Catholic thinker since the late Scholastics.Read more at location 682
When read for its own sake, Centesimus Annus emerges as an uncompromising rejection of collectivism in its Marxist, Communist, Socialist, and even welfare-statist manifestations. While the encyclical allows for a certain amount of intervention by the State in such areas as wage levels, social security, unemployment insurance, and the likeRead more at location 692
distinguishes the economic system from the ethical and cultural context in which it exists.Read more at location 699
Centesimus Annus can criticize the excesses of materialism and consumerism and still endorse a free economyRead more at location 700
When seen in this way, Centesimus Annus represents the beginning of a shift away from the static, zero-sum economic worldview that led the Church to be suspicious of the system of free exchange and to argue for wealth distribution as the only moral response to poverty.Read more at location 708
it becomes evident that they are unfamiliar with the continental economic tradition represented by Wilhelm Roepke, Ludwig von Mises, F. A. Hayek, and Israel Kirzner, or with the insights of the Virginia public-choice schoolRead more at location 718
A further implication of this encyclical is that entrepreneurs and capitalists have been invited out of the moral cold to which they felt exiled in the past.Read more at location 720
The “Christian-Marxist dialogue” is dead, as many former adherents of liberation theology are willing to concede.Read more at location 724
“Compassion and love must be coupled with a careful grounding in the relevant philosophical, economic, political, and social issues. If the … social activist proceeds in ignorance of the accepted tools of economic analysis, he risks turning bad situations into something far worse.”Read more at location 748
